National union leader leads rally for funding, against Brownback

Educators with the American Federation of Teachers and the Kansas National Education Association listened Saturday as American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten spoke on the south steps of the Kansas statehouse.

Blue-shirted educators, American Federation of Educators, joined red-shirted members of the Kansas National Education Association to march from the Brown v. Board of Education Nation Historic site to the Statehouse, where they rallied for more K-12 spending and protections for teachers.

Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers and leader of its 1.5 million educators, was in Topeka on Saturday speaking to a gathering of both American Federation of Teachers and Kansas National Education Association.

House Minority Leader Paul Davis, Gov. Sam Brownback's Democratic opponent, attended the rally of educators that marched from the Brown v. Board National Historic site to the statehouse Saturday. Davis then spoke to those gathered.

Lucinda Noches Talbert, granddaughter of Brown v. Board plaintiff Lucinda Todd spoke to educators who gathered at the Brown v. Board of Education site Saturday morning before they walked to the statehouse for a rally asking attendees to "Raise Your Hand to Reclaim the Promise."

Lucinda Noches Talbert, granddaughter of Brown v. Board plaintiff Lucinda Todd spoke to educators who gathered at the Brown v. Board of Education site Saturday morning before they walked to the statehouse for a rally asking attendees to "Raise Your Hand to Reclaim the Promise."

Addressing a crowd of hundreds of teachers Saturday on the south steps of the Statehouse, Randi Weingarten thundered in a voice that belied her petite frame.

“We will not be silenced,” Weingarten said.

Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers and its 1.5 million members, visited Topeka for the 60th anniversary of the Brown v. Board decision.

Her group used the anniversary to muster opposition to Gov. Sam Brownback and the conservative-led Legislature, saying their policies are leading the state to greater educational inequality in contrast to the 1954 court decision.

Blue-shirted educators from AFT joined red-shirted members of the Kansas National Education Association in a march from the Brown v. Board of Education National Historic site to the Statehouse, where they rallied for more K-12 spending and protections for teachers.

Weingarten whipped up the crowd of several hundred by telling them Brown v. Board’s legacy demands they fight those seeking to destabilize public education to promote private alternatives that will leave some children behind.

“There is a real attack on the institutions that remain a ladder of opportunity,” Weingarten said.

The discussion was tinged with criticism of the Legislature’s failure to restore education dollars lost during the recession. Advocates linked stagnant per-pupil funding to a lack of school nurses, counselors, extracurriculars and intervention services.

“To follow up belt-tightening with additional cuts that were not necessitated by the economic situation has been a struggle for many of our schools, and I do not believe this reflects what our values in this state are,” said Heather Ousley, a parent and advocate from Merriam who co-founded Game On for Kansas Schools. “I do believe Kansans value education. I think that is one of the things we have historically gotten right.”

Randy Mousley, president of the United Teachers of Wichita, criticized Brownback’s income tax cuts and supply-side economic theories as outdated and “reckless.”

“The road map for Kansas currently is just wrong,” Mousley said, referencing Brownback’s five-point plan. “That just has to change, and it has to change in the primary election in August and the general election in November.”

“Put it on record: Brownback’s got to go,” Mousley said.

Brownback has maintained that the income tax cuts he spearheaded can coexist with increased school funding, pointing to K-12 spending totals that include burgeoning state contributions to teacher pensions and capital projects. His campaign website touts an increase in “total state aid” of $200 million from the time he took office in 2010 to the 2015 budget. It also highlights 676 more teachers and a 2.3 percent increase in the average teacher salary since he became governor.

“Teachers across Kansas are learning that they will be receiving pay raises because of the leadership of Sam Brownback on the school funding bill just passed by the Legislature,” said Brownback’s spokeswoman, Eileen Hawley. “Just last week Shawnee Mission School District announced pay raises for its teachers. More and better paid teachers is Sam Brownback’s priority for getting more money to the classroom.”

Another decision released in early March found that the state was failing to fund schools equitably. A separate question about the sufficiency of overall funding is still being litigated.

Brownback signed a bill to address the equity issue, but the legislation also included a controversial provision ending state-mandated due process protections for teachers with three years of experience.

Brownback says the provision allows for more local control because individual school districts may still offer due process.

But KNEA objected strongly, and educators have picketed the governor’s recent public engagements.

Two years ago, the conservative-led Legislature also prohibited teachers and other public officials from automatically deducting certain union dues from their checks.

KNEA president Karen Godfrey and others have said they feel under attack. Weingarten said that fits a national pattern orchestrated by corporate interest groups.

“Starve the schools, criticize them relentlessly, demonize the teachers, marginalize those who fight back and peddle private alternatives,” Weingarten said.

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This is only the beginning. Farmers and Ranchers in counties throughout Kansas have had more than enough of the conservative social extremism and the failed economic experiment as they see their property taxes and sales taxes go through the ceiling.

Rational Kansans will keep the pressure on all Summer and by Labor Day the Koch money and multi-sourced dark money will not be able to rescue the failed governor and presidential candidate.

We'll see who's laughing then. Democrats are going to get slaughtered in the mid-terms. Republicans will own the House and the Senate and your precious President will become the fastest lame duck in American history. Unions are a vestige of history yet but they're the only ones that don't know it yet.

Conservative doesn't always mean wise or knowledgeable
Our abuse of the Constitution, Bible and each other has destabilized our education system. NCLB has not proven to be a winner. Children's rights presently outweigh those of adults and pseudo-adults. Makes a tough environment that has many opting for home schooling, and wondering why they should have to pay for the chaos they opted out of.
What good are quadratics, Pi to infinity, daily revised history, ad nauseum, when one can't learn due to a hostile environment, because the core values of Matthew 7:12 and 1 Cor: 13 are scorned? Our local school recently "encouraged"senior pranking. Capitulation is expensive. But it's easier to blame the "reigning party".
We have our democracy. Are we enjoying it? Will we maintain a maturity necessary to keep it? The Beatles were right. Money can't buy me love. Now if we could just learn not to care so much for it.

So the Democrats staged a protest using the 60 year anniversary of Brown v Board to be the spotlight on a significant crossroad in our history. Well, how opportunistic of them and how terribly disrespectful. So, rather than be a day where the story could be focused on a landmark supreme court ruling whose purpose was to provide equal opportunities in education for all races, a decision representing decades of struggle and oppression that finally paved the way for educational access to all, the day was taken hostage by a Democratic party and it's gubernatorial candidate Davis.

There are few words that can describe the flagrant audacity, the ostentatious hypocrisy, the pompous distastefulness and the aberrant dishonor of the celebration of an event that impacted the nation's advancement of racial equality and those who sacrificed and fought so valiantly to achieve that goal.

What a disgrace to the legacy of plaintiff Lucinda Todd to have her granddaughter, Lucinda Noches Talbert, embrace a protest which in no way represents or memorializes the significance of Brown v Board on the very day of it's remembrance but rather prostitutes it's importance for a hijacked political agenda. Then, to lead the march with, "Raise Your Hand to Reclaim the Promise", a declaration appropriate for continuance of racial equality but having no related connection with the protest being demonstrated, is additionally aberrant.

A day that should have been reverend and esteemed as the landmark Supreme Court ruling that it was instead was prostituted by a New York resident, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers who claims to have visited Topeka for the 60th anniversary of the Brown v. Board decision. Instead, Ms. Weingarten was really here to lead an organized protest alongside blue-shirted educators from AFT and red-shirted members of the Kansas National Education Association.

A protest whose true motivation was to politically advance the Democratic gubernatorial candidate Paul Davis, who just happened to be present with speech in hand. A protest whose underlying motivation was a group of unionized teachers disgruntled over a law passed that would provide for the same equal employment practices in the state of Kansas to apply to teachers as well rather than union dictated employment practices. Employment practices which render overly cumbersome and costly attempts to reasonably and effectively terminate a teacher based upon poor performance standards. Employment practices which have for decades prohibited Kansas from realizing the best teachers are employed for the educational advancement and success of our children.

What a shameful and humiliating robbery of a 60th anniversary marking a historic landmark decision for racial equality, stolen by a self-serving and pompous Democrat-led agenda and a self-serving unionized teacher's group whose true motivations are politically-driven as well as self-promoting but far removed from the celebration of racial equality.

Maybe he just doesn't understand the point. The point obviously is pretty simple. Just another reason to dislike labor unions. They believe they should put education behind their wants. Education and our children takes second second place to their demands.

JacksonCo1, if you think your taxes are high now, elect a Democratic Governor who helped push through the largest tax increase in state history .... and believes the state should be spending a lot more money in a multitude of areas. Where do you think those funds will come from?

Last time I checked GOP controls the legislative branch in Kansas and has for sometime. It's time for change. It's clear our Kansas legislators no longer care for public education. Perhaps that's because they sent all their kids to private schools.

Do you really believe that we truly provide equal educational opportunities for all regardless of color, nationality, religious persuasion, sexual orientation...? Did you hear the speeches at the rally today? Are you totally sure that it was a Democratic backed event? Do you really think that Kansas can't do better for our children? All your pompous words and run on sentences show that you don't recognize that we are still lacking in equality for our citizens and not only in education. Brown brought us forward but we are not there yet, that is what the protest is about.

We get it, republican is right and everyone else is wrong,,,,,,, i can fill three pages of semantics here but I'm not a party line puppet, I do enjoy you trying to channel the comment section/ Hilarious, it will be what it is. But you go gyrl! Get everyone to step in line!

I didn't say Republicans are right and democrats are wrong.....but Mr. Sme makes it clear he is a left wing demagogue and he made a boorish comment. I replied. I don't like Brownback. I hope he loses. He was a mistake. But just because he's a Republican does not give you the right to paint us all with the same brush. Yes I earn good money. Yes we should spend more money on education but that woman screaming yesterday wasn't there to raise the quality of education, she was there to raise teachers' salaries. If you disagree, you're a fool. She and Sme are both of the same lefty ilk and I was just giving them a taste of what is to come.

I guess you feel qualified to see the future. why don't you go be a teacher if you think they have it so good. Your children probably go to Carparavel or such a place so you don't care if public schools are funded.

At least you don't support Brownback who is ruining our state for future generations

I am an independent who just leans more to liberal because I find a lot of Republicans are self righteous people who feel like they are the only ones entitled. If that offends you then I hope your are not one of them.

We should feed the poor...and we do. That said, not every single dime this state raises in revenue needs to go to the disadvantaged. Tyranny of the minority (yes there is such a thing) is no way to run a government. Democrats aren't the only bleeding hearts either. I do tons of volunteer work; upwards of 500-600 hours a year (for those that can't add or don't know what a 40 hour work week feels like because they're on here all day long, that's 12.5-15 of those weeks). Donating as well as fundraising for charities, cooking for and feeding homeless people....by my own hand, and directly aiding people in need of other services our hand-out progressive bureaucracy doesn't provide. I'm not some conservative oddity. There are many like us that feel that income redistribution to the degree we face it today is wrong, inefficient, and isn't even effective in most cases for solving the problem it was created for in the first place. It only extends the problem. The left disagrees. So be it. It is your right and your beliefs are no better than mine. BTW, bible thumper....the verse you are quoting about the rich and the eye of a needle alludes to the distractions and the temptation to stray from "the path" that you face when you can "afford to do what you want." It means it's often more challenging and your faith has to be stronger..... not that its impossible for the well to do gain salvation. Truth be told, Jesus only once spoke literally and directly when teaching...and it wasn't that story. The rest of his teaching was allegory and parable....to provoke original thought. So.....I guess you probably did read your Bible wrong; and shame on you for using it for propaganda. Go to Confession.

Yes, I could afford to send my kids to Cair Paravel or Topeka Collegiate, but I don't. (Besides, why would I pay twice to educate my children since the private option is off the table thanks to union thugs like Ms. Weingarten?) The Seaman district is a phenomenal place to be. I wouldn't go anywhere else. A little secret.....it has nothing to do with how much their teachers get paid. Its because we are a cohesive community. Most of North Topeka revolves around the activities of that district. The rest of Topeka should take a hint. Stop squabbling about money and go make a difference YOURSELF in your OWN community. That's how you build strong kids and strong schools.

And, although I admit it takes a village to raise a child, I pretty much got myself where I am. I'm not entitled to anything. It could all go away tomorrow and we'll just start over again. We did it once right? I'm a pragmatic, compassionate conservative. I think the way to govern and to assist people is with long term success in mind.....for the people...and the State. I feel handouts are not the answer. Teach, train, create a system that provides opportunities to go to when they are done. You have to clothe, house, and feed them during that process and then send them on their way but....psssst...they have to be in that process. I have seen and done a lot in the "system." Many of those people aren't on that road. They're on no road at all. And the system is moving more towards cash payments with no strings attached that makes it so easy to abuse and takes away any stigma to receiving assistance. It should be uncomfortable to receive assistance. You're supposed to WANT TO GET OFF! But that's not what I see lately. And that's not what I see from the increasingly Progressive movement that, in my opinion, is ruining this country (hell the world for that matter) not making it stronger and more prosperous for generations to come. Some of you disagree... and you're entitled to. Go for it. I can have a civil conversation or I can throw mud with the best of them. Its all up to the people on the other side of the screen. I don't see much to converse with...that's why I'm watering my mudpile. Heeheehee.

You're probably right. Noting in government changes much. In one way, that's how it supposed to be. In another way, the medicine is the poison as well. Most of government does not have our best interests at heart....I don't care which party they belong to. As adults, we should be well used to that. Try to be one.

How does this not fall under out of state influences on state politics? We hear all the time about outside influences that aid conservative candidates and how they are wrong. Where is the disdain for those aiding the other side? Oh, the other side is democrat so they get a pass. I understand now.

The powerful teachers unions who are more worried about politics than educating our kids along with democrat billionaires will spend millions of dollars trying to destroy Brownback and that's democracy in action.

But somehow the Koch brothers spending their own money doing the exact same thing is tearing the country apart.

The Democratic Party has totally lost its way. It is now controlled by a number demagogic far-left groups who have no regard for national unity or national purpose. They are in it for their own selfish reasons, and the rest of the country be damned.

How hypocritical for the AFT and the NEA to say, "It's all about the children." The education and the vocational/professional futures of our children are WAY down on their self-centered priority list, and we all know it.

I'm so reminded today of the angry and self-righteous hullaballoo created in Wisconsin by Gov. Scott Walker when he reformed taxation and brought the teacher's unions to heel. Now we have the same group of losers trooping to Kansas to create their trademark hue and cry.

Randi Weingarten doesn't care a fig about Kansas or anything in it, but she thought she would use the visit of the First Lady to attack the leadership of a Republican bastion. Deep in this article the reporter does, in fact, list the increases in funding for education and for teacher's pensions, etc., promoted by Gov. Brownback and passed by the legislature. But nothing is ever enough for the Ideologues of Victimization who run around the country trying, and, sadly, usually succeeding in setting one group of Americans against another.

The Left in America, led by Obama and the Marxists like Weingarten, never had any intention of "bringing us together." If there is a better example of a celebration hijacked by people with egotistical, anti-American motives than last week's B vs BOE event, I haven't heard of it.

Early in the UNITED STATES a 6th grader was performing at a sophomore college level. Now in america a college sophomore has to learn what they should have in secondary school. Schools are nothing more than re-education centers for social engineering. We spend more than most countries on education and continue to fail. Only special interest groups and unions seem to be coming out ahead. This nation is fading and another will take its place. We have failed the generation coming after us. "We have sown the wind and will reap the whirlwind".

Teach instead of indoctrinate and stop whining.....most don't work nine months and then rally to whine and blubber about how bad things are.

No wonder our Governor got booed, that's what these so-called 'teachers' do to OUR children, turn them into a bunch of mind-numb, below-average Socialists that emulate themselves....disgusting and a total waste of excessive funding.

I see a lot of blame game here. Have you, people who think they know about school people, been to school lately? Schools are over crowded and maxed out. Business men would cry foul if they had to work like that. They would say that more money would allow them to become more successful and then they would improve the state of Kansas. Some how all they conservatives think that is good for business but not helpful for schools. Are you kidding me?
I work in the schools and I am in and out of many classrooms. I am still waiting to see any of these worthless teachers and union power the conservatives worry about.
What I see is people working and children learning. I do see that we do not get all the children. We educate everybody and you can not change someones IQ. They will never test well. We also lose children to the lack of a parent and the constant battering that poverty brings.
Please help children. Vote.. We need to have people who represent all the people and that means children. Grown people should be able to make in on there own. Children are the ones who actually are to be supported.

Another reason Randi Weingarten polluted Kansas with her presence is the fear that once union dues can no longer be automatically deducted from a teacher's paycheck, the dues "take" for the union will fall off dramatically. Most teachers are not fools.

Where does this money go? Most of it goes directly to the Democrat National Committee to elect Dems across the country. Is it any wonder that Randi is on that Committee?